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Proposal For Gnome To Become Linux-Only

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the oh-that'll-be-fine dept.

Moderator writes "Could Gnome drop support for non-Linux operating systems? That was a recent proposal on the Gnome mailing list, although there were significant objections in response. Quoting: 'It is harmful to pretend that you are writing the OS core to work on any number of different kernels...the time has come for GNOME to embrace Linux a bit more boldly.'"

50 of 292 comments (clear)

  1. I support this! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I support this because it can only help to make Gnome more irrelevant.

    1. Re:I support this! by rjmx · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Agreed. Even as it becomes less customisable (so as not to frighten the less-experienced, apparently), Gnome gets ever more bloated as time goes by.
      Methinks the Gnome developers have totally lost the plot.

    2. Re:I support this! by clang_jangle · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I was waiting to see if they screw up the 3.0 branch and piss everyone off like kde4 did, but I guess the anticipation was killing them so they had to find a way to start alienating users now, in spite of having no newly-designed crappy interface yet.

      Good time to be a wmaker and openbox user...

      --
      Caveat Utilitor
    3. Re:I support this! by Aighearach · · Score: 4, Informative

      Gnome isn't the controlling factor for Gtk+, and that support would never have OS lock. We're only talking about "Gnome" here, not Gimp or the Gimp ToolKit (Gtk). Gnome is just another user of the widget set that happens to share a first letter.

      We're actually not even talking about most of Gnome. Just Gnome Shell.

    4. Re:I support this! by MrHanky · · Score: 2

      What are you talking about? Gnome 3.0 is out, and it does have a totally new interface, some kind of weird tablet-desktop hybrid, which does alienate lots of users.

    5. Re:I support this! by arose · · Score: 2

      Good time to be a wmaker and openbox user... Just use plain old console, if you are not going to move forward at least do it with style.

      --
      Analogies don't equal equalities, they are merely somewhat analogous.
    6. Re:I support this! by tyrione · · Score: 2

      I don't give a shit about Gtk+. However, Glib is critical to my ability to port certain software to other OS's; lots of Unix software uses a Glib event loop, GObject's, GModule's, and GThread's underneath. If Gtk+ goes Linux only, how long until Glib also does?

      How about you stop shitting yourself and actually research the discussion, before making a complete picture of yourself as a mix of paranoia.

    7. Re:I support this! by DrXym · · Score: 2

      Calling users of lean, efficient interfaces (who often script in additional functionality to fit our needs) "masochists" just makes you look like a n00b.

      Actually it's because I've endured numerous desktops under UNIX / Linux over the 20+ years I've been using them and I dislike those that make me spend more time fixing & tweaking the desktop than doing the things I'm running the desktop for in the first place. The desktop's job is to facilitate stuff the user wants to do, to adopt a sensible set of defaults, to provide a reasonable amount of customization, to be forgiving of errors, to provide all the functionality a normal user needs through a GUI (i.e. no trips to bash to edit files), to provide services & facilities to apps such as drag & drop, notifications etc., to allow users to efficiently managed files and apps and to generally stay the fuck out of the way thereafter.

      Which is why I suggest that people who use desktops which don't do those things are masochists. Maybe you like your wmaker, and you're free to run it. It doesn't mean it's suitable for the majority of users however. It is very clear that while GNOME 3 and Unity have glaring flaws that both are going in the right direction and a point release or two will address those flaws.

    8. Re:I support this! by DrXym · · Score: 2

      My sentiments too. The perennial problem with Linux is usability, that users are expected to have in depth knowledge of their operating system just to use a desktop and work around its flaws. It makes no sense at all. If Linux is more usable, it becomes more productive. If Linux is more usable, more people will use it which is a net benefit to the platform and people who make a living from the platform. I suspect there are people who see Linux as an exclusive clique and that attempts to open it up are somehow a threat to that.

  2. Dumb Idea by Perl-Pusher · · Score: 4, Informative

    Since developers from other OS's have contributed to Gnome. KDE would then be the only recourse for them. I think gnome would quickly lose support based on the ill will that would generate alone.

    1. Re:Dumb Idea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      This is a dumb idea for software architecture reasons, too. I'll explain.

      When writing a Windows application, you must recognize that the interface between your application and TODAY'S version of Windows must remain fluid such that you can support changes delivered by patch or by OS release. This is known formally as "decoupling" and it is necessary to isolate big systems that need to communicate. Decoupling is important for unix applications as well, because kernels change over time and APIs vary slightly between unixes.

      If you truly believe your application gains anything by eliminating a decoupling library/layer, you have missed the point of the past few DECADES of object-oriented programming.

    2. Re:Dumb Idea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

      KDE on the next release is looking to be the same. Hello? release it as early beta and do NOT call it a release until all the tools that are used to make it useful to noobs are ported to the changes.

      Instead we get a mature interface that is abandonded and will not support it anymore because they all moved to the new shiny.

      The "mature interface" was quite frankly the result of years of hacks, that were somehow superglued together.
      The most basic change sometimes involved rewriting major subsystems, and tons of projects ended up being abandoned because they were practically impossible to incorporate into KDE 3.5.

      The real problem with KDE 4 though, was distros making it default AGAINST THE WISHES OF KDE DEVELOPERS.
      KDE Developers has specifically stated that distros looking for stability and feature-parity should wait until later KDE 4.X releases, but distros wanting to be "cutting-edge" forced it on users.
      KDE 4.0 was intended as a call to developers to port their applications over with a promise of relative stability in the KDE libraries from that point, and a call for theme developers and the like to do the same, and a chance for the morbidly curious or advanced users to get used to the new system, it was never intended to be "finished".
      I won't say I agree with their decision to bump the version number, but it was already delayed and they decided that to not put it off further would speed up the porting of applications and the finishing of the DE, and they were very clear about what the release was and wasn't.

    3. Re:Dumb Idea by Jonner · · Score: 3, Interesting

      KDE is far from the only recourse, as there are a number of other Desktop Environments already in common use, including XFCE and Unity/GNOME 2. However, GNOME requiring systemd would be a giant mistake as it would be a kick in the face not only for non-Linux based OSes, but for any Linux-based distro that use a different init. I haven't followed the Canonical /GNOME controversies much, but this inclines me to think Canonical isn't being as unreasonable as some think to diverge from GNOME. Optional systemd integration is probably a good idea.

    4. Re:Dumb Idea by sxeraverx · · Score: 2

      The first rule of computer architecture is that any problem can be solved by an additional layer of abstraction.

      (The corollary to this is: ...except for too many layers of abstraction.)

    5. Re:Dumb Idea by quickOnTheUptake · · Score: 2

      While there is something to what you say about the final user experience being what matters, you are also a little too short sighted. Sometimes working around other people's crappy product is just too much for developers to be reasonably expected to do.
      So to go with your example, say the electricity on one floor of your house goes out after the plumber came, and the plumber explains that it seems the incompetent ass that wired your house didn't bother running a negative line to that floor, but just twisted the negatives to a copper water line (which the plumber had to replace). This is not really the plumber's fault, and the plumber wouldn't reasonably let himself be held accountable for the bad result, but would tell you you need to go and bitch to the incompetent that ripped you off with the shoddy work in the first place.
      A self-respecting developer will only fill up his own code base with ugly hacks to accommodated other poorly written programs to a certain point before he tells his users to bark up another tree.

      --
      Mod points: Guaranteed to remove your sense of humor.
      Side effects may include gullibility and temporary retardation
  3. Oh look, it's in relationg to systemd by Nursie · · Score: 2

    And therefore Lennart Poettering, who has said this sort of stuff A LOT.

    I have no major objection to change, or to things like PulseAudio (not that I use it on many systems). However the "leave it all behind, let's do cool stuff with the advanced features of the linux kernel" argument is an odd one.

    For an init process like systemd, sure, I can see that. For a desktop manager/wm/application suite? Not so much.

  4. So what? by airfoobar · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It's open source. If there are people who want it on other platforms, they can just fork it. Right?

  5. WTF? by gstoddart · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Gnome is supposed to be written to support X Windows.

    I currently use gnome on my Linux and FreeBSD platforms, and have for quite some years. Now they're looking to tell the rest of us to PFO because they've tied themselves too tightly to Linux ... why is it even tied to the kernel anyway?

    The end result will be that I and others won't use Gnome at all (not even on my Linux installs) ... but, hey, if your "be all you can be" plan is all about working on only one system, that's fine. Just don't be surprised when the number of people who use it drops off.

    --
    Lost at C:>. Found at C.
    1. Re:WTF? by FooBarWidget · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The days that desktop environments are only GUIs and only consisted of a bunch of windows that paint stuff on the screen are long over. These days desktop environment handle a lot more lower-level stuff, and users rightfully expect them to do so. Think for example user interfaces for managing hardware, system settings (user accounts, security, firewall, wired and wireless network), etc. GNOME depends on various background daemons that must be started at boot. All of these things have system-dependent mechanisms. Configuring the wireless network is completely different between FreeBSD, Solaris and Linux. All 3 of those OSes have a completely different init system, completely different firewall system, etc.

    2. Re:WTF? by Lunix+Nutcase · · Score: 3, Informative

      Because it's claimed that systemd will provide "better user experience" as espoused here. I don't really buy most of the arguments like since many them don't seem to be things that should require a dependency on an init system to fix.

    3. Re:WTF? by qpqp · · Score: 2

      I have to disagree. I believe, it would be possible to work with a common configuration api (e.g. what the user sees and interacts with) with modules for each OS; much like the webhosting control panels do. Configuring wireless parameters can also be brought to a common denominator.

    4. Re:WTF? by DarkOx · · Score: 2

      And none of that stuff is hard to deal with. Look end users don't build Gnome unless they are pretty advanced. Distributions package Gnome or they don't. So all you have to do is have a middle layer. That middle layer has a specified backend. You tell the distros look you need to create a /etc/gnome.rc directory (or something else if you pass option to configure). In that directory you need to have scripts for the following named rd.wireless, rc.firewall, rc.adduser, rc.deluser, rc.moduser and so on and so forth. Those scripts will take the following arguments blah blah blah.

      The people packaging gnome for the distro then simply write the scripts to do what they have to do make the configuration changes. This is not a hard problem to solve... It would mean Gnomes firewall, wireless, widgets would work everywhere!

      --
      Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
  6. Non-Linux? What's that? by KiloByte · · Score: 2, Informative

    As a dev of Dungeon Crawl, I see that systems that smell like Unix these days are a monoculture of Linux and Linux only. Even though you'd expect roguelike players to be biased towards obscure systems, I don't recall a single bug report from a *BSD or Solaris user. Even Hurd had one. Big-endian systems are dead too (two distinct users, one with an old MacOS X, one with Debian on powerpc).

    Everyone these days uses either Windows, Linux or x86 Mac.

    --
    The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
  7. Time for a Fork by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    If I were a non-Linux dev who'd contributed to Gnome, I'd be seriously considering a fork no matter what the outcome of this is. If there's one thing I've learned from working on open-source projects, it's that once the Linux Zealots' radical proposals start gaining real traction it's time to bail.

    1. Re:Time for a Fork by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      These changes are not being proposed by zealot's. These changes are being made through corporate decisions. Almost every single gnome dev in favor of this move works for Redhat. It's an effort will eventually shut out competing companies like Canonical and Oracle unless they either fork the project, or switch to another DE. Oracle has the money to throw developers at it, but they only care about their hardware. Canonical is way too small to do it, barely breaking even in revenues (if even that).

  8. How the community wants to do things by DarkOx · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Outside a few egomaniacs with a one distro to bind them all mentality, this is not how things have been done up till now. I don't think the larger community wants to change either.

    FreeDesktop.org has turned out some nice software but I don't like what they doing. Its one thing to suggest some high-level standards and try to create some consistency among projects that are already tied to a set of core libraries, its another to have to assume your specific daemon systemd or whatever is running. There is no reason to require something like that when it would be simple enough to abstract things in away that highlevel stuff like a gtk dialog can start an stop services in whatever way a particular distro wants to set things up.

    Taking Gnome entirely Linux specific is the same deal, it means you have to accept a whole heap of stuff and conventions or you can't use it all. Thats dumb, ultimately its going to make distributions more varied not less. As a few core decisions will determine the entire software stack.

    Over the short term it will enable people to polish up somethings and make them work real nice, as time marches on though its going to mean that something written for a Debian based distro wont be portable at all to something based on REHL or Slackware, or any of the BSDs. We will all end up with few software choices not more.

    --
    Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
  9. Re:Lets look at it by sremick · · Score: 2

    Gnome works wonderfully on my (and others', including other posters in these comments) FreeBSD desktops. I can't stand KDE.

  10. Can you get Gnome to replace X? by jellomizer · · Score: 2, Interesting

    The problem is that Gnome has always fit in an odd spot. Above X11 (which is OS/Hardware Dependent's) and below the Windows Manager (In which GNOME often lets you choose who you want, to an extent). I would think Gnome Development if becomeing a Linux-Only product should be used to help remove X11 from Linux.
    X11 has become Linux's problem.

    The XWindows system was designed as a way to view a GUI over a network. For its time it was quite good at what it needed to do. Sending vector images, common commands to the X Server to display the images worked wonderfully in a world of simple graphics and low bandwith. Today it is becoming extra overhead. Performing rather slow over the network compared to newer tools even RDP is fast compared to X11. And more time is being spent to make it perform well. Problems with trying integrate Open And Closed source drivers and stability issues. Have made the need for X11 out of date. Gnome having a large applicationbase already using its API could create a situation where it can replace X11 and give Linux a Modern approach to the UI. Much like how Apple did it with OS X over a decade ago. Being able to Give Linux a GUI that is more advanced the Windows or OS X because its new core for UI is based on the 21st century technology vs. 20th century. Things like Resolution independent displays, better integrated 3d, and multi-touch. Many things we have now but are made as a hacked add on vs a core development of the UI.

    Linux should no longer bother wining the desktop. Let Microsoft keep the desktop, Linux need to win Mobile, and Touch pads. Otherwise Linux will win the desktop space only after the desktop is irrelevant. Although much of us Old Fogies will fight against the idea of the Desktop demise, I doubt it will die but it will become like the mainframe a generation ago, moved from a needed device for computing to reserved for functions that it is really good at. We still have mainframes new ones running and selling but not for every company. Just as with desktops/laptops it will move to software development and CAD firms. Pushing other companies to go with more mobile devices, and perhaps like the iPad with an optional external keyboard just for writing letters.

    --
    If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    1. Re:Can you get Gnome to replace X? by Lumpy · · Score: 5, Informative

      "Sending vector images, common commands to the X Server to display the images worked wonderfully in a world of simple graphics and low bandwith. Today it is becoming extra overhead. " says the man who does not manage a large deployment...

      Sorry but MOST linux enterprise installs used X heavily. it's call thin clients and the biggest selling point to get Linux in the door.

      $250.00 per user cost with no per seat costs and a reduction of IT staff by 50% is HARD to ignore..... X is what delivers that ability.

      --
      Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
    2. Re:Can you get Gnome to replace X? by jellomizer · · Score: 3, Insightful

      You are doing it wrong.
      1. If you are an adminstrator of any worth you can do it without X via command line.
      2. Almost all enterprise Applications that are fairly new are Web Based
      3. There are other just as affordable or more affordable remote access "thin client" solutions available.

      X11 is an aged and out of date protocol. It had its use, today it is a dinosaur. Just because you work on badly managed enterprise or aged model, it doesn't mean everyone else does.

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    3. Re:Can you get Gnome to replace X? by MobyDisk · · Score: 2

      What kind of customers use this configuration?

      I haven't seen a deployment like that since the mid 90's. Most places I knew of that did this were replacing them with FAT windows machines because they could do so much more with them and they had gotten so cheap. I just assumed web apps finally displaced that last holdouts to remote X windows usage.

    4. Re:Can you get Gnome to replace X? by dotancohen · · Score: 2

      You are doing it wrong.
      1. If you are an adminstrator of any worth you can do it without X via command line.
      2. Almost all enterprise Applications that are fairly new are Web Based
      3. There are other just as affordable or more affordable remote access "thin client" solutions available.

      X11 is an aged and out of date protocol. It had its use, today it is a dinosaur. Just because you work on badly managed enterprise or aged model, it doesn't mean everyone else does.

      1) No real Scotsman
      2) Just rewrite all your existing enterprise software to be web based!
      3) Money is never the issue in enterprise

      --
      It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong.
    5. Re:Can you get Gnome to replace X? by shibashaba · · Score: 2

      1. I think your missing the point. They probably do, but this is for end users.
      2. Ones that are fairly new. Most enterprises are not fairly new and have had computers before the web.
      3. Buying something to go on top of something is just not as elegant a solution as something that has been around for decades. X is a very mature platform, whether your using Xorg or one of the many commercial X servers available.

      --
      ---------- Open Source is capitalism applied to IP.
  11. Re:Lets look at it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    In the BSD community, there is a desktop movement (PC-BSD, several smaller forks out there). While I haven't seen a lot of support behind Gnome (most BSD desktop projects default to KDE or something even leaner), Gnome going Linux only would force the desktop movement in BSD to pretty much go KDE.

    Frankly Gnome is too bloated for most users at this point. Going Linux only wouldn't fix Gnome's problems, their projects are much, much bigger.

  12. Re:Abandoned by Dr_Barnowl · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This is about the GNOME Toolkit (GTK) rather than the GNOME shell itself (which doesn't run on Windows AFAIK). The Windows port allows applications like GIMP to run on Windows.

    Removing support for other environments would be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it would allow you to concentrate more efforts on making the Linux features better. On the flipside, it could really hurt open-source adoption - if GTK apps become unavailable on Windows, you obviously can't try them out without running Linux, which is a bridge too far for many people. If you try out GTK apps, and like them, they become a bridge to adopting Linux ; you can be sure that the apps you found useful are available to you on your new platform.

    I'd probably not have too many qualms about dropping support for OS/X - after all, they are in a minority. But I can't help but feel that dropping support for Windows is a mistake.

  13. Re:Lets look at it by hedwards · · Score: 2

    You do realize that some people do use *BSD for a desktop, right? It's stable, flexible, and with the coming of projects like PC-BSD and DesktopBSD, it's more or less trivial to get it running for a user. As trivial as it is to get some of the more consumer oriented Linux distros up and running.

    Personally, I'd shed no tears at all if both KDE and Gnome were to disappear, the environments seem to want to install all sorts of things which I may or may not want, and while they are useful for some people, it's annoying to have to install them just for a couple of irreplaceable applications.

  14. Re:Abandoned by Dr_Barnowl · · Score: 4, Informative

    Or maybe I'm talking out of my butt, and it IS about the shell. Should RTFA.

  15. Re:I vote no. by Beelzebud · · Score: 2

    Xfce seems great to me. I dumped Gnome3 for it, and haven't looked back. I still do not see the logic of taking Gnome 2 and just throwing it away.

  16. Re:Lets look at it by he-sk · · Score: 2

    Most Gnome apps require an X server under OS X meaning they suck donkey balls. They don't use the global menu, copy-and-paste works differently, and they generally don't "look right." I have seen GTK-applications compiled natively for Aqua and while the situation is better from a UI point of view, the build process is the worst thing I've ever encountered. For instance, Gnucash requires to be installed into /opt and insists on starting its own dbus instance (even though there's already one running) and doesn't bother to terminate it when finished.

    Having said that, I love the Unix support that comes with OS X. I get much of my work done on the command line (mutt FTW) or in programs that started out on Unix and were adapted to the OS X GUI such as MacVim and Aquamacs (an Emacs clone).

    --
    Free Manning, jail Obama.
  17. it is open source by sgt+scrub · · Score: 2

    there will be a fork. besides, it isn't like everyone is sticking with the gnome interface.

    http://tuto4log.blogspot.com/2011/04/ubuntu-411-arrives-with-unity-new.html

    --
    Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.
  18. Re:Lets look at it by fusiongyro · · Score: 4, Informative

    I think you're missing out on PC-BSD, which is a more desktop-oriented FreeBSD. There's also DragonflyBSD which was developed to improve SMP support, again largely for desktop performance.

    If you'd run CDE, you'd be in a better place to appreciate GNOME's usability on Solaris. I don't see what this has to do with thin clients either.

    Gtk support on OS X has traditionally been kind of iffy. I haven't had luck running Haskell + Gtk on OS X. I am not aware of any apps that use it. It doesn't help that Qt supports OS X natively.

    Ultimately, I think the question is whether or not the loss is worth the gain. I don't personally use GNOME but I also don't see the potential gain here as being worth the loss of community. It's not a great idea to abandon any segment of your userbase, because the rest of your userbase will get skittish. Not something you need with a combination of high-profile competition (Unity) and consistently eroding support. I don't think this is likely to go through, but if it does, I'd say you can expect GNOME to be dead within two or three years.

  19. The proposal is nothing of the sorts! by tvelocity · · Score: 5, Informative

    This "GNOME to drop non-Linux support" sensationalism on the net is ridiculous. There has been no such proposal! Yes, I RTFA and the full mailing list discussions.

    The proposal in GNOME's desktop-devel-list was by the author and maintainer of systemd to let GNOME adopt systemd as the mechanism to configure certain system-wide settings, like locale and timezone data. This would be implemented as a dbus interface which would spawn a mini-daemon via systemd when that was required. This would solve the age old problem of every distro having their own slight variation on how to configure these things.

    Notice the key part of the proposal: the dbus interface. This is the proposed dependency, and not the whole of systemd which, yes is Linux only, but in reality is just a reference implementation for this dbus interface which can be VERY easily reimplemented on any system (the minidaemons themselves are very trivial, porting systemd to other platforms however is not).

    What this proposal ACTUALLY means: (a) Non Linux platforms, or Linux distros not yet using systemd, would initially have grayed out certain configuration options in the control center, like locale for example. (b) These settings can be made available just by implementing a trivial dbus interface.

    Nothing of this dropping non-Linux OS support nonsense. Hope this clears up the nonsense somewhat

  20. Gnome has dropped Unix more than 6 years ago by Billly+Gates · · Score: 2

    I used to use FreeBSD and Gnome was becoming an annoyance back then. Gnome started doing things like dumping OSS for ALSA and using video standards taht only worked under Linux.

    If you used Gnome 2.0 or 2.2 under BSD you are using a heavily patched version that grew more and more significantly different as Gnome matured. Sun called their gui the Java desktop as it was mere Gnome based for Solaris. I remember an interview with the FreeBSD team where they were clashing with gnome developers. The problem is KDE 4 was so aweful that many Unix users wanted to switch to Gnome as a result.

    I have not ran FreeBSD in many years as I use Linux on a VM partition inside Windows 7 but it seems Unix is still more a server oriented platform anyway which is why I do not run it natively anymore. I do admit Gnome-Shell/Unity and KDE 4 is what made me dump Linux for good as my main OS so I am prejudiced agaisn't Gnome.

    --
    http://saveie6.com/
  21. Re:Abandoned by Filip22012005 · · Score: 3, Informative

    GNU's not Unix Image Manipulation Program Toolkit is the foundation fro the GNU's not Unix Network Object Model Environment. So getting that wrong isn't really your fault.

    --
    When the policeman of the tie, rule you violate, hello punishment of the kitty?
  22. What are these guys smoking? by Beelzebud · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Gnome went from being the most usable, stable, "just works" DE for unix-like systems, to a steaming pile of crap, IMHO. I'm still in shock that they took a stable, functional foundation that was Gnome 2, and just literally threw it all away. I tried to give Gnome 3 a chance, but it's like a damned cell-phone UI.

  23. Re:Isn't Gnome a X11 window manager? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Nope. Neither GNOME nor KDE are "X11 window managers" by the accepted use of the term.

    You may want to look through this website
    http://xwinman.org/
    to get a better idea of what distinguishes a window manager from a full fledged desktop

  24. bass ackwards by glebovitz · · Score: 2

    I'd rather see Linux drop support for GNOME.

  25. a bit bold by gumbi+west · · Score: 2

    " time has come for GNOME to embrace Linux a bit more boldly" Nothing says bold quite like the phrase, "a bit"

  26. Re:Non-Linux? What's that? by yarnosh · · Score: 2

    No, BSD is just so stable that it has a stablizing effect on all application running on it. It automatically detects and repairs bugs on the fly.

  27. I offer a modest counterproposal by mysidia · · Score: 4, Funny

    As a BSD user; I strongly suggest that Gnome become BSD-only.

    KDE seems more appropriate to the part of the Linux market that wants the OS to be a Windows clone, anyways.